The Crossing Places

When she's not digging up bones or other ancient objects, Ruth Galloway lectures at the University of North Norfolk. She lives happily alone in a remote place called Saltmarsh overlooking the North Sea and, for company; she has her cats Flint and Sparky, and Radio 4. When a child's bones are found in the marshes near an ancient site that Ruth worked on ten years earlier, Ruth is asked to date them.

An atmospheric creepy mystery set in Saltmarsh

This engaging story is well written and totally captures the hauntingly lonely sea side life the main character has chosen for herself. She is a fore..Show More »nsic archeologist working in the field, lecture hall and with the police as a solver of crime. Her work focuses on working out mysteries from the past and present. The story is heavy on nature, mythology, archeology and spookiness in general. I really enjoyed the narration and way the book unfolded. It held my interest-- as any good page turner should. As the first book in a series it bodes well for readers who enjoy crime stories with a dash of odd characters and brooding nature thrown in. But be aware--it is creepy!

The Janus Stone

Forensic archaeologist Ruth Galloway is called in to investigate when builders, demolishing a large old house in Norwich to make way for a housing development, uncover the bones of a child beneath a doorway - minus the skull. Is it some ritual sacrifice or just plain straightforward murder? DCI Harry Nelson would like to find out - and fast.

Return to Salt Marsh & Mysterious Archeology

I just love the way Griffiths brought the characters back from book one in the series as old friends. They are people that have been changed by their ..Show More »experiences together in the previous book. Often I find in a series that the main characters are too static as personalities. Not so with this author. Even better, this book continues to develop these interesting, flawed but fascinating people without missing a beat. This installment picks up just months after book one finished. Probably best to start with book one if you are new to the series. The books do build on one another and it is assumed that the reader already knows much detail that is not reviewed. A good thing-- as I dislike a great deal of recap in a series.

The mystery and backstory were as well thought out, engaging and as spooky as they were in book one. It was also funny in spots! I really enjoyed this listen and loved how the whole tale played out. Creepiness, brooding wild sea coast, archeology and history all perfectly intertwine to make a really enjoyable listen. I'm looking forward to the next book in the series. Really good and recommended if you enjoy a good mystery.

The House at Sea's End

A team of archaeologists, investigating coastal erosion on the north Norfolk coast, unearth six bodies buried at the foot of a cliff. How long have they been there? What could have happened to them? Forensics expert Ruth Galloway and DCI Nelson are drawn together again to unravel the past. Tests reveal that the bodies have lain, preserved in the sand, for sixty years. The mystery of their deaths stretches back to the Second World War, a time when Great Britain was threatened by invasion.

A Shaky Series Installment

Not sure what to think about this third book in Elly Griffiths' spooky mystery series set in wild coastal Norfolk. I loved the first two books and I ..Show More »save these titles in my library as treats to be enjoyed and looked forward to. I should have known something was up when several other reviewers queried--and I quote here--if Griffiths wasn't going barmy? I confess I had to look up the exact meaning of the term barmy. It may be apt.

The book was convoluted and rambling and at times beyond comprehension as it was so outside of what I would consider normal personal and even police behavior. In a way it was like listening to a family member--still half asleep retelling a long mixed up dream they had just had and wanted you to sort out for them. Some things just don't make any sense.

In addition, there are four or maybe even five major errors in the storyline. I can't elaborate here as I hate plot spoilers--but someone--author or an editor should have picked up these problems. I have read other reviews that found errors that I missed and I am not counting those in my list. This gives me further pause.

In the end the story works itself to a neat close but these characters are becoming not just flawed but frankly unlikable. On the whole the book was just too sloppy and careless for my taste. Proceed with caution is my best advice on this one.

A Room Full of Bones: A Ruth Galloway Investigation, Book 4

It is Halloween night, and the local museum in King's Lynn is preparing for an unusual event - the opening of a coffin containing the bones of a medieval bishop. But when Ruth Galloway arrives to supervise, she finds the museum's curator lying dead beside the coffin. It is only a matter of time before she and DI Nelson cross paths once more, as he is called in to investigate. Soon the museum's wealthy owner lies dead in his stables, too. These two deaths could be from natural causes - but Nelson isn't convinced.

Elly Griffith Is Back in Better Form

I was disappointed in the previous Ruth Galloway mystery (The House at Sea's End). Three stars disappointed. I actually said that I wasn't looking f..Show More »orward to forensic anthropology with a toddler. However, the author made a decision to have a significant event in the relationship between Ruth and her baby's father happen between books that actually seems to help the story arc in my opinion.

The story opens with the death of a director of a small local museum. He is found lying dead beside the coffin of a medieval bishop that had been excavated from a site that had once been a church and then an industrial site. The window is open, a single shoe lies on the floor and a guide book whose pages riffle in the breeze. Ruth Galloway, forensic anthropologist, finds the body. Murder or natural causes? A drug habit might argue one, but menacing letters in his desk drawer might argue the other.

The museum also houses some Australian aborigine bones that a group calling itself the Elginists (Lord Elgin's marbles but I'm not sure why they named themselves after the guy who took the marbles from the Parthenon) want repatriated. These bones were collected by the ancestor of the founder of the museum, Lord Smith. Lord Smith is also a racing stable owner, married with three adult children, one of whom helps with the stable, one who is a successful QC and one who is a wastrel.

Meanwhile Harry Nelson's team is also dealing with the importation of high quality drugs from over seas that apparently no one in the criminal community knows about.

The disentangling all of the threads kept me interested through the entire story. There was one thing that niggled at me after I finished the book but I can't tell it without spoilers so I just have to say that it might bother others also.

I gave this book 4 stars because it was a better than average entertainment even with the occasional fault.

Dying Fall: A Ruth Galloway Investigation

Ruth Galloway receives a phone call that bears shocking news. A friend of hers from college, Dan Golding, has been killed in a fire at his Lancashire home. Her shock turns to alarm when she gets a letter from Dan. He has made a discovery that will change archaeology forever but he needs Ruth's advice. Even more alarming, he sounds vulnerable and frightened. DCI Harry Nelson is also rediscovering his past. Up north for a holiday, he meets his former colleague Sandy MacLeod, now at Blackpool CID.

Still a great series

Action, suspense, great characters and a well-written story. I am getting used to the narrator/voices in my head disconnect (you know, when what you'r..Show More »e hearing isn't how you thought the characters should sound ); Ms Corbett is absolutely capable-her men sound like men, her accents are amazing, and I like her voice.

If you're up for a decent forensic series without a lot of gore and isn't going to leave you unable to sleep at night, allow me to suggest this entire series. And I do suggest you start at the beginning to get the full flavor of how things are put together and who these people are.

And I'm delighted to say that while this series is beginning to flag a bit, it is still a solid 4 stars.

The Outcast Dead: Ruth Galloway, Book 6

Forensic archaeologist Ruth Galloway has excavated a body from the grounds of Norwich Castle, a forbidding edifice that was once a prison. She believes the body may be that of infamous Victorian murderess Jemima Green. Called Mother Hook for her claw-like hand, Jemima was hanged in 1867 for the murder of five children in her care. DCI Harry Nelson has no time for long-dead killers. Immersed in the case of three infants found dead, one after the other, in their King’s Lynn home, he’s convinced that a family member is responsible, though others on his team think differently.

You gotta understand, I love this series

Ruth Galloway is such a sympathetic character, not perfect, not beautiful, but intelligent and resourceful, determined and straightforward. She strug..Show More »gles to balance her life as a single mom with her job as a forensic anthropologist. This story continues her inquiries into the history of her North Norfolk home,along with a contemporary mystery that parallels the historical investigation. As with any book that is driven by character more than action, I am very pleased to have visited with Ruth for a spell. If you like Deborah Crombie, or Louise Penny, you'll be happy with this series by Elly Griffiths.

The Ghost Fields: Ruth Galloway, Book 7

Norfolk is experiencing a July heat wave when a construction crew unearths a macabre discovery - a buried World War II plane with the pilot still inside. Forensic archaeologist Ruth Galloway quickly realizes that the skeleton couldn't possibly be the pilot, and DNA tests identify the man as Fred Blackstock, a local aristocrat who had been reported dead at sea. When the remaining members of the Blackstock family learn about the discovery, they seem strangely frightened by the news.

All in all, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you enjoy the play?

This was not my favorite in the series, to say the least. Perhaps I would like it more if I had read it, as I did any of the previous books. I do give..Show More » credit to the narrator for her gift with accents (although why can't they ever "do" American) and her female voices are good but the male characters are all are very poorly interpreted, which is quite off putting. Nelson sounds like a dolt and Cathbad's dreamy, mystical sound is trite.I look forward to each new Elly Griffiths mystery but in this one, I identified the killer very early on...not satisfying at all. Also, I am kind of bored with the whole Ruth/Nelson thing....fish or cut bait, already!(Oh, nuts, I'm sounding like quite a curmudgeon!) Read the series in order...I loved the early books!